Category - Community

A poorly-kept Texan secret is the half-joking, half-dead-serious rivalry between Houston and Dallas. It’s a superiority contest that prompts audiences to groan and giggle when Dallas is mentioned on stage at a comedy show. There’s a particular sting when popular acts visit Austin and Dallas on tour but skip over Houston — we’re so much bigger than Dallas! Our restaurant scene is amazing! We have UGK and Rothko Chapel and Ninfa’s ! At the end of the day,...

There’s a very 1980’s, brick-wall-stage-background misconception about earning your place in standup comedy requiring a minimum experience of several years. This outdated flavor of gatekeeping has long been the tool of the majority to claim ownership over a thing so nebulous, so ever-changing as comedy. While the old guard gives way to younger models, comedy is constantly evolving to keep pace with our constantly-evolving world. Newcomers like Kari Burt who hit the ground running...

A writer, artist, comedian, sex worker, podcaster, and a virgo, Britt Vasicek contains multitudes. She’s a glass-half-full kind of person, and in that glass is a bubbling mimosa. Britt is an experience — a performance — but she’s not putting on an act. While many of us perform normality or virtue every day as upright citizens, Britt performs authenticity — outward expressions of genuine vulnerability, giddiness, graciousness, righteousness. Her preferred medium...

The midterm elections on November 6, 2018 marked the end of one political cycle for the country and the start of a new political cycle for the city of Houston. 2019 will be the year that Houstonians get to select their leaders and Kris Banks is an LGBTQ leader who works closely with our current mayor, so he expects this year will be busier than usual. Banks, 38, is the Special Assistant on Government Relations for Mayor Sylvester Turner. In this role he works with elected officials and the

Disproportionately, LGBTQ folks can end up lonely on holidays because their family isn’t supportive of their status. Some people don’t have the luxury of coming out to family, and some just aren’t there yet. Some have lost their parents and feel alone on family-centered holidays. Even with healthy family relationships, great distances and hectic schedules can still keep you from the family dinner table. Chosen families are a matter of queer survival, and no better place...

Although it isn’t officially a national holiday, Election Day is always an important part of our democracy. Houstonians can usually expect to rock the vote a few times a year. The 2018 election gives us the opportunity to cast our ballot in several important races but in order to do that you need to know where to go and when you need to get there. Texas is a largely non-voting state, meaning that the large majority of people eligible to vote do not. Of course some people make a conscious

Halloween may be one of the scariest holidays of the year but one of the scariest facts about the state of Texas is that we are dead last when it comes to voter turnout. That means that the percentage of people eligible to vote versus the number of people who vote is lower than every other state. When you don’t turn out to vote you don’t get candidates that represent our interests. Elections aren’t only every four years when we decide on a President. They actually take place...

The term triple threat is commonly used to refer to a performer who is a dancer, actor and singer. Well, Houstonian Harrison Guy is a triple threat: dancer, activist and inspiration. Currently, he sits as Chair on the Mayor’s LGBTQ Advisory Board, and is the founder and creative director of the nonprofit Urban Souls Dance Company, a modern company that specializes in exploring African-American culture, heritage and expression. From a young age, Harrison knew he was born to dance and...

Beyond the droning chorus of misogynistic think-pieces deriding selfie culture as vapid and narcissistic are the very real positive effects that a curated self-image can have on women, people of color, and LGBTQIA folks. For people pushed into the margins of dominant cultural narratives, self-love is a radical act of healing. Self-image as an autonomous vehicle for empowerment didn’t start with the front-facing camera, but with self-portraiture in art. The Venus of Willendorf, the...

If you’re anything like me, you’ve definitely been sucked into a marathon of Law and Order: SVU (DUN DUN) on more than one occasion. And if so, you’ve heard the detectives talk about transporting criminals to “the tombs.” Well, it isn’t only criminals who experience going there, sometimes it is individuals fighting for social justice. Just ask Houstonian, Ali Lozano. In April 2011, Ali was arrested and detained for around 26 hours for protesting and...